Enhanced
by Fallen Ark Angel
Summary: Steph has something personal she wants to discuss with Paul. With maturity. Which, at the moment, he doesn't really feel up to exhibiting... - One-shot.


"I just feel like I've bulked up too much," Paul was going on as Steph mostly just sat there, on her side of the hotel room bed, halfway watching him, mostly thinking. He was seated on the edge of the bed, back to her, as he glared over at the window. The blinds were drawn and there was nothing to stare at anyways, even if they weren't, but he didn't seem ready to lie down yet. "Out there in the ring tonight, I didn't feel as fast. I've felt that way since I first got back. You know? I mean, yeah, I knew I was putting on a bit, but I didn't think it would bother me as much. I just-"

"Do you think I should get a boob job?"

That got him to shut up. Finally. Usually Paul let Steph lead their conversations, but he'd been going on for days about his new look since returning from his quad injury. Don't get her wrong, Stephanie loved listening to the man talk (and sing and yell and snore and cough and breath, basically), but at the moment, she had some stuff she wanted to get off her chest too.

Pun most certainly intended.

"W-What?" Paul glanced over his shoulder for a second, thinking he'd misheard her, as she'd said it while he was in the middle of his boring speech. "Steph?"

She was lying on her side, head propped up in her hand and shrugged the best she could from the position. "Do you think?"

Turning swiftly so that he could lie down too, his brown eyes were large as he nodded his head. "Yes. To what size? Yes. Whatever it is. Fine. That's cool. I mean...yeah, no, yeah, you should."

"It's not a joke, you know," she told him with a roll of her eyes.

"Who's jokin'?"

"If you're not going to be serious-"

"I am being serious! Yes! Bigger boobs. Shit yes. Why did you even ask?"

"Because I wanted to have a serious discussion-"

"How is this not serious?"

"-but you're acting like it's a game, so never mind-"

"What did you expect me to say, Steph?"

"I dunno." She made a face over at him. "I didn't expect you to, like, completely insult me though-"

"When did I insult you?"

"I dunno, Paul. What if while you were sitting over here, grumbling about how much better looking you were a year ago-"

"I said nothing about looking better. Just-"

"-and I started agreeing? That wouldn't make you feel like shit?"

"What are you implying then? Huh?"

"Obviously," she said with a heavy frown, "that you don't appreciate the breasts that I have right now."

" _Obviously_ ," he said with a big cheesy grin, "I thoroughly enjoy them, Steph. You forget what I did to those last night or what?"

"Or what." As he laughed at that, rather tiredly, Steph shifted closer to the man. "And I am being serious, so try to be grown up for a moment, huh?"

"How much more grown up do you want me?"

"Completely."

Heh.

Reaching a hand out, he pushed some of her hair out of her face before saying, "Okay. Let's be mature."

"'kay."

"What's more mature than a pro and con list? Huh?" Paul cleared his throat. "So, pros. What are they?" When she only stared, he said, "The obvious one is, your breasts will be bigger."

"That's the plan, yeah."

"Another one is that I'll probably cheat on you less if they are. And no con compares to that, so- It's a joke! Stop pushing me!"

"It's not funny."

At all.

Shifting onto his back then (she was pushing him over anyways), Paul stared up at the ceiling as he said, "What brought this on, Steph? Huh? That you just suddenly-"

"It's not sudden." She shoved at his side one last time before falling back onto the bed beside him, this time face down. Turning her head so that she could stare over at him, she said, "I've thought about it. A lot. And talked about it with other people."

"What other people? How could you talk about it with other people? When I'm the only one that's directly affected?" Then he frowned. "Other than you, of course."

"Of course." She rolled her eyes. "And I just talked about it with some of my friends, is all. I've been thinking about it and-"

"And you wait until after I'm stuck in a hotel room all the time, with nothing to do, because of my bum quad?" He snorted. "Some girlfriend you are."

"What would those two things have to do with one another?"

He turned his head to the side, just to give her an incredulous look. "You're tellin' me, Steph, that you don't think it could raise some morale, among other things, for me to know that my super hot girlfriend-"

"Was I super hot before I got bigger breasts in this scenario or-"

"-was gonna come visit?"

"Uh, excuse me," she said with a glare, "but I did visit you. Constantly."

"Yeah, but your boobs are...you know, how they are now. And-"

"I'm done." That time she turned away from him as Paul only laughed at her. "Never mind. We won't talk about it."

"Steph, I'm just kidding. You big baby."

"I am not."

"Are too." Rolling onto his side once more, he quickly pulled the woman back up against his chest. "You know I fucking love you. Love fucking you. Love you fucking. You love fucking. I think I'm out of combinations, but-"

"I just," she griped, elbowing him in the gut as he tried to nuzzle against her neck, "wanted to have a real, open conversation. That's all."

"But that's no fun."

"Paul-"

"Have you really been thinking about this, Steph?" His tone was less jolly then as he relaxed his hold on her. Stephanie didn't move in the slightest. "Or are you just talking?"

"I've been thinking about it a lot."

"What made you?"

"I dunno."

"You just woke up one day, looked in the mirror, and thought, wow, I'm small?"

Another elbow. She didn't realize that he had a bruise there, from being in the ring, but he only sucked in swift breaths as silently as he could.

"No," Steph told him through what he was certain was a frown. "I just… I'm not daft, Paul."

"Daft what?"

"I mean that I'm not…oblivious, you know. Out in the ring."

"Well, apparently I am. What are you-"

"About how guys are always...shouting about me about-"

"Steph, seriously? They call you a whore too. Are you a whore?"

"To a lot of people, yeah, Paul, I am."

Huh. Wrong example.

"They call you stupid too. Are you stupid? Huh? No. So there." He felt as if he'd beaten her with that one, but also knew that she probably wouldn't see it that way. "Who cares what those drunk assholes say anyways?"

"I do."

"Steph-"

"It's not only that though."

"Then what else-"

"I just would feel...better about myself."

"There's nothing to feel bad about yourself about."

"Just saying something like that doesn't absolve my feelings."

"Your feelings are stupid."

"Insulting them doesn't either."

Pulling her tighter to him once more, Paul's head was bowed as he breathed against her ear, "If you're honestly thinking about this-"

"I honestly am."

"-then there's only one question I have for you."

"I'm not going to suck it, if that's it."

"We'll get to that later, princess."

"Oh goody."

"I was just going to ask," he asked as, when he relaxed his grip once more, she turned in his arms so that they could face one another, "about, you know, the important thing."

"Which would be?"

His brown eyes were practically sparkling. "Cup size."

"Paul-"

"You're my best friend, Steph."

"Am not."

"It's only natural that I'd wanna know everything there was to know about your operation. Mainly the outcome."

"I'm not even sure if I'm doing it yet," she pointed out. "I just wanted to talk about it."

Paul laughed then, as if just from excitement over the idea, before saying, "Shit, Steph, it'll be great."

"But will it though?"

"I have a bad feeling we're about to go over the cons now."

"Only if we're going to be mature."

Nodding a bit, he said, "Go on."

"I just… I'd have to buy all new bras."

"I'll buy them for you. If you do this. I'll buy you everything."

"Babe, you couldn't even afford dinner tonight. I bought dinner."

"I could afford it. I just didn't have my card on me because someone left it in the hotel room-"

"Yeah. You."

"You're my woman. What good are you if it's not holding my stuff for me?"

"I'm sorry, am I your woman or your purse?"

"I don't see the difference."

"Anyways," she went on with a frown. "I mean, I still need to think about the implications, you know, of doing this?"

"What implications?"

"Everyone will...I dunno. Make fun of me."

"For what? Doing something that you want to do?" Paul stared hard at her then. "You are the one that wants to do this, right, Steph?"

"That's what I said."

"Because don't do it for those stupid, douche fans that literally tug one off to you anyways-"

"Paul, don't be gross."

"It's true! They're just all drunken asshats." And he meant that. "I should know. I'd probably be the same way, had this quad tear gone the other way and I had to, you know, retire."

"You would not have."

"I wouldn't?"

"In the literal sense, that you'd come to shows, to yell derogatory things at me? I'd definitely hope you wouldn't have."

"You broke up with me, I just might have."

"But even in a general sense," she went on, "if you had had to retire-"

"Praise be to...whatever, that I didn't, eh?"

"-you would have clearly just followed me around constantly and been my little lap dog. Right?"

"You get this boob job, I might just have to retire anyways and lock you up somewhere. With me locked up too." He gave her a big grin. "Although, the idea of sitting in a crowd and yelling obscenities at you does sound nice-"

"You were never going to do that. God, do you ever listen?"

"No."

"You were going to follow me around and be my..."

"Your what?"

It was her turn to grin at him. "My bitch."

He gave her this really scrunched up face then, the one that she gave him constantly, and it made the woman giggle heavily. As she laughed, Paul moved to shove at her that time, Steph rolling onto her back without a word spoken between the two.

"Tell me this, Steph." He propped his head up on his elbow as he stared down at her. "You don't really think that you're not...attractive, right?"

"The most attractive."

"You better mean that," he ordered her, ignoring the sarcasm in her tone. "Because I mean it when I call you it."

"Oh, whatever."

"I'm serious." His brown eyes locked with her blue. "And I just don't say it because I love you."

"Awe."

"Awe what? Awe, I love you? There ain't nothin' to awe about that, princess." Reaching a hand out, he tapped at her nose with one of his meaty fingers. "That's just the flat out truth. I don't say it to be cute or to make you swoon."

"I have never swooned over anything in my entire life so-"

"Oh, please. You know that first RAW I came back, you could hardly contain yourself." He'd left his finger on her nose and pressed down a bit. "It's alright. Admit it." He cleared his throat before dropping his tone low and saying, "Triple H really turns you on."

Steph was fighting hard not to giggle or blush or anything other than stare up at him with her own heavy gaze. "Paul Levesque really turns me on. These days, I find Triple H rather trite."

"Come again?"

"Not to mention, since returning, he's been more than a bit...sluggish in the ring-"

"See? You always do this. You can insult me as a joke-"

"Who's joking?"

"-but when I joke about you-"

"You don't have the same...body issues that I do."

Brows furrowing, he said, "So it really is about that then? Huh? Steph?"

"What?"

"You don't feel...attractive or something, the way you are?"

"No," she groaned, both their tones losing their jovial notes. "I just… I lost a lot of weight recently."

"Right. Which is what you wanted."

"Yeah, but it made my boobs get, like, so much smaller and..."

"You asked me what I thought, right? At the start?"

Steph nodded a bit, at his question as Paul removed his finger from the tip of her nose, moving it down to rest on her stomach. Pressing down slightly, he said, "I think that as long as you truly are doing it for yourself, because you think that it will help you look better or because you want to, you know, uh...fill out a different cup size or whatever, fine. Do it. But if you're doing it because you're tired of the fans making signs and chanting dumb stuff at you, forget it; they'll always do that. They're pigs. Jerks. And we feed off it. It's the nature of the business. So just… Do it for you. Just like everything else in life, do it because it will make _you_ feel good. No one else."

"I know," she mumbled as he gave her a slight smile. "Of course I know that."

"Well, then you may or may not know this too," he started once more, "but a lotta people think that I, well, that, you know, I have a pretty big nose."

She wasn't ready for that, but was able to stop from laughing at him. "What? No. Not you."

"Steph."

"It's handsome," she said, reaching her own hand up then, pinching his nose. "Definitely your most attractive feature."

"I'm not like you, Stephanie. You don't have to lie to me about things like that. Men don't need their ego inflated with falsehoods about their looks."

"Right." She even rolled her eyes. "Like how I was just supposed to stay quiet on the inert in the ring thing."

"Right," he mocked. "Like I'm supposed to know what inert means."

"You-"

"My point, Steph, is this," Paul cut her off. "I don't give two shits what anyone says about my nose. Because I know they do. A lot of people. You think it was easy going through school with this? Huh?"

"Still think it's cute."

"And I think that you're cute. Just how you are."

The hand on his nose fell then, so that she could cup his cheek. "You're too kind."

Nuzzling against her palm, he said, "I try."

"But baby," she began as she moved her hand then, pushing some of his tangled locks away from his eyes. "There is one thing."

"What's that?"

"It kind of sort of sounded like you were trying to talk me out of a boob job which seems a bit-"

"The fuck I was." He wagged his eyebrows at her. "I'm thinking size… What's the largest breasts go?"

"You don't wanna know." She flicked his hand before dropping her arm. "Really."

"Hmmm." Paul shifted once more, though it was to fall down, just a bit, so that he was halfway lying on her and halfway off. One arm tossed over her, he said, "I just wanted to tell you what I really thought. That's all. I'm not just in this because I get to bang the hottest woman alive, you know."

"I'd hope not, because you might be in the wrong relationship then."

Turning his head, he kissed her cheek before mumbling against it, "I'm in this for the money."

Eye roll didn't even begin to describe what he got then. "Of course."

"And because you need someone like me around. I put you first, clearly. Telling you all that."

"Uh-huh."

"A lotta guys would be all over it from the start."

"You kind of were."

"I was joking." Her cheek got another kiss. "Making sure you're alright is always my top priority. In everything."

"Mmmm."

"And if we didn't have to get up in, oh, what is it now? Eight hours?"

"Closer to seven."

Nodding a bit, he said, "I might just fuck your brains out to show you how hot you really are."

"Not sure how that correlates-"

"I don't fuck ugly, babe."

"-but sure."

He let out a long breath before shutting his eyes. "You set the alarm?"

"Mmmhmm."

"Good. Then g'night, St-"

"You are not," she grumbled, shoving at him then, eliciting chuckles from the man, "sleeping on me this way. Get off. You'll crush me!"

"I might not have body issues, babe," he laughed as he rolled back onto his back, "but you're slowly building them up."

"Oh, hush." Steph didn't move to cuddle against him, rather rolling onto her stomach. Still, she moved to rest the hand that was closest to him into the one he had lying closest to hers, his palm open and waiting. Closing it as her fingers fell between the cracks of his, Paul grinned.

"Neither of us," he said as he heard Steph's breathing slow, "turned off the light."

And that was true. He'd been in the middle of a rant, when she'd cut him off and led them to where they were.

"One of us'll have to get up to pee," she muttered against her pillow. "Eventually."

"Mmmm." Paul turned his head to the side, watching her for a moment. "You're perfect, Steph. No matter what you decide."

"And you're the best to ever set foot in that ring. No matter how much slower you feel in it."

Grinning, he went back to staring up at the ceiling. "Thanks, babe."

"I mean, other than me," came her final words for the night, "of course."

Paul drug the hand that he had clasped with hers closer to him, pressing a kiss to their joined fingers. "Of course."

* * *

 **Listening to old interviews from around '02 (the Howard Stern one and one of the Opie and Anthony ones in particular) of Steph and damn, I don't think anyone else has ever been as open about getting a boob job. Helps, I guess, when it's written into the show constantly, but still. Clearly she and Paul discussed it at least once (or a lot), so here's that.**

 **Anyhow, you guys gave me a lot of requests, so I'll start on those soon, hopefully. Just gotta figure out plots for all of them. Always open for more though.**


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